Cringeworthy
by Alexius Meinong
Summary: Nick and Judy are the best of friends. But when Judy's past trauma resurfaces, will it prevent them from becoming something more?
1. Uneasy Lies the Head

Nick and Judy sat on the curb next to their patrol car, knocking back cans of RC Cola.

"Carrots, you've gotta stop hitting the 'Royals so hard," Nick opined, "I know they're refreshingly crisp, but think of your blood glucose level."

As if on cue, Judy smashed her fifth can against the sidewalk with an eviscerating screech. "Sweets when there's nothing to do," she muttered, her ears twitching restlessly. "Sweets when there's nothing to do. Can't help it. Plus, it's blazing."

The two were waiting for their contact, Rich the Platypus, outside of a taco stand in Sahara Square. Rich was a bookie in the mini-horse horseracing ring, an illegal and highly lucrative sport. Mini-horse jockeys ride horses without proper lumbar support. Nasty stuff.

Nick smirked. "Suit yourself, but save the rings for me."

Judy looked up at him with a wary eye. "What for?"

"I know a guy at the farmer's market who spaces them out between some puka shells, sells them to the yaks for fifty bucks a pop. 'Necklaces,' he calls it! Hah. Cuts me in."

Judy felt her heart flutter. Every time Nick displayed his entrepreneurial wiles licitly, the otherwise-proud and proper bunny would grow weak in the knees. But no! He'd never go for a small town girl with big dreams and an upbeat attitude, like her. She was just a friend.

"The folly of it!" Judy cried aloud.

Nick frowned at her. "Well, it's worked out so far. Oh, look, here comes Rich the Platypus."

Rich the Platypus sauntered down the block towards the duo, characteristic nark aviators perched on his wide platypus beak. A large tape cassette printed conspicuously through his wifebeater.

Nick and Judy stood up and leaned against their cruiser trying to look nonchalant.

"Hey Nicholas Wilde and Judy Hopps, police officers. I hope you don't arrest me for a crime I committed with some of my many associates," Rich carefully enunciated.

"Your wire doesn't need to be on all the time, Rich." Judy explained, finishing off her seventh RC Cola with a jostling swig.

Rich glanced left, right, then beckoned Judy and Nick to lean in, handing over the wire. "It's going down tonight at the old glue factory warehouse," he murmured out of the side of his beak, "on Tundra-Canal and Fifth. Nine O'Clock. Good soundproofing in case there's another trample."

Nick shook his head while smoothing out his fur where it had become matted from sitting on the curb. "Amateurs. What kind of circumference can you get in there?" This wasn't his first rodeo.

"That's such a good point!" Judy ejaculated. She didn't know if the dizzy spots floating in front of her vision were caused by Nick's street smarts, or the sugar rush from her eleventh 'Royal of the afternoon. She adjusted her footing, a blush finding its way to her cheeks. "Uh, that's such a good point, Nick, Officer Wilde, we should probably tell the chief so we can coordinate a stakeout."

Rich the Platypus coughed loudly. "Before you do that, officers, a nark doesn't lay his truth-eggs in your mind-burrows for nothing." His eyes darted deviously between the two. "There's the little matter of my… reward."

"Woa hold up," Judy interrupted. "What do you want?" She glared suspiciously at the Platypus.

Nick joined in. "What do you want, friend? Yeah, you get paid, but why the ominous ellipses? Why the creep look?"

"Yeah Nick, I mean what is that about, is he gonna Jafar us?" Judy raised an eyebrow.

Rich blanched. "I mean, I'm a nark, there's supposed to be some dramatic flair. I'm requesting my… reward." He gesticulated menacingly.

Nick pointed at Rich's gesticulating claws. "I don't know, are you gonna Jafar us or something? What's with that shifty look? And, no, Rich the Platypus, the claw thing is making it worse,"

"Or, are you asking for some licentious favor?" Judy gasped.

Nick nodded in agreement. "Yeah, do you want a fake license or something? I can hook you up, but not on the clock."

"Oh, nothing like that," Rich answered, punctuating his words with a dark chuckle. "You see, I only want…"

Rich pointed a lone claw at Judy.

"...your remaining thirteen 'Royals."

* * *

Seven hours later, Judy and Nick were staked out in a parking lot a block down from the warehouse- the warehouse where the mini-horse horserace was set to go down. Two other teams watched from the rooftop of a neighboring building. There, they awaited the chief's order.

Nick glanced down at his sulking partner, letting out an empathetic 'tisk' as he looked her up and down. Sure, the 'Crown is a harsh mistress, and Judy's pancreas was better off without the remaining thirteen they had paid to Rich the Platypus. Still, Nick couldn't stand to see her hurting; Judy's a good kid, he thought, and her pep's all that gets her through the day… she didn't deserve this.

"Judy!" He wrapped his arm around the wounded rabbit and leaned into her across the center console. "You gave up a lot for the force today. You really are a good cop."

Judy's breath hitched. She looked up into Nick's eyes, searching for an anchor to hold onto amidst the crashing pre-diabetic waves of grief threatening to drown her.

She found it.

"Oh Nick," Judy buried her face into his shoulder, weeping openly. "I just don't know how much more I have left to give. It's like this city is an ice cream scoop and I'm the bottom of the carton."

Hey there, bud," Nick lifted her chin, "The best thing about someone like you? As long as you don't give up, your tub never runs dry. Carrots, you're vanilla-blueberry swirl all the way down. And your buddy Nick's gonna stick by you through it all."

Judy had never wanted anyone or anything more in her life.

Scrambling across the center console, Judy planted herself in Nick's lap and kissed him furiously. After what seemed like an eternity because Nick had failed to reset the dashboard clock after changing the cruiser battery, the two separated.

"Oh Judy, what the heck. You can be my gal."

Judy smiled a small smile.

"You can change your status to 'In a Relationship," Nick added.

"Oh… my… gosh." Judy began hyperventilating, crying fat, happy tears. "I just, oh Nick, I just can't even, I'm so thankful. Can I tag you in it?"

Nick patted her shoulder. "No, let's… no, we aren't going to do that."

Judy grinned a big grin. "Okay!"

The cruiser radio crackled to life. "Stakeout units, move in!" The chief's voice rang out loudly in the compact cruiser cabin.

Judy hopped off of Nick and into her seat. "No time to update now, partner," she said coyly, "let's go do our job."

Nick cranked the ignition and put pedal to the metal, sending them screeching toward the warehouse.


	2. Horsin' Around

Flashes of light, gunshots, and eighty surprised neighs, give-or-take. The mini-horse horserace was over soon after it had begun.

"Oh, they caught on, Nicky-Boy, they were one step ahead of me!" Rich the Platypus cried as Nick cut him free. He'd been tied to a trailer bed.

Nick looked at Rich's feet and noticed holes in the webbing. "What did they do to you, Rich?" he asked, dreading the answer.

Rich grabbed Nick by the collar. "They saw me wearing one of them 'Royal ring puka necklaces. Caught on. Broke my 'aves, drove me around the track… _they used me as a racing lure_."

Judy came up behind them, leading a cuffed mini-horse jockey. "A lure?" she puzzled. "But it's a horserace."

Rich fixed her with a haunting stare, subconsciously rubbing the holes in his feet. "These aren't your spawn-momma's horses, no ma'am."

Judy and Nick felt it best not to press further; instead, they headed to a police wagon with their cuffed jockey. Together, the three coordinated teams had arrested every jockey and horse, carting them away.

"So… last horse of the night," Judy beamed up at Nick. "I was… would you like to—"

" _Mini_ -horse," the jockey muttered through clenched teeth.

Judy scoffed, rolling her eyes. "If that's what you're calling yourselves, now."

"Hopps! I heard that!" The duo turned to see the chief fuming at Judy. He gave her a pointed look, because he had horns. "Get over here."

"Yes, sir!" Judy chirped, shoving their perp jockey into the wagon before bounding off.

Nick winced. He knew what was coming. Third citation in three months.

The first came after Judy's level-four cavity search of a wombat, because "...anything with a built-in pouch has something to hide."

Incident number two: Judy had insisted they pull over a male chimp on his way to the library. "There aren't any Crossfits in this part of town," she'd commented with a knowing smirk. "What reason does he have to be here?"

The chief caught that one in a random dash recorder sample.

Nick pinched between his eyebrows. 'Kid,' he thought, 'nine times out of ten, you're on point. But that backwater, Deliverance-esque upbringing of yours comes back to bite you every now and then.'

He felt a tap on his shoulder.

"Let's get out of here."

"You okay? Remember, your tub never runs dry, as long as you…"

Her face remained blank, and she wouldn't meet his gaze.

"Take me somewhere."

Nick sighed. "Paperwork first, you taught me that, remember?" He smiled at her, figuring it was worth a shot.

"I'm suspended for a week," she said. "Take me somewhere."

Nick grabbed her paw in his, and the two made for their cruiser.

* * *

"Look, Nick, they change it all the time," Judy mumbled, "it's not my fault if normal folks don't want to keep up with their label-of-the-week nonsense."

They sat in Nick's apartment, sipping Siberian Husky coffees. Both were too raw from that night's events to stay at the coffee-shop.

"But babe, can't you just let them call themselves whatever they want? They're 'mini-horses,' whatever. Is this sort of thing worth a stand?" Nick reasoned, pulling her closer to him, and deeper into his caved-in sofa.

"First it was 'Horselets,' and then 'Non-Pony Smalls," Judy counted on her paw. "Not my fault if they find it offensive when folks don't keep up with the times," she huffed.

Nick sighed for the millionth time that night. "Hey, earth to Judy! This is your dream job, remember?" He nudged her. "Don't throw it away by making something out of nothing."

Judy topped her coffee off with a few shots of 'Royal, taking her time to mull over an answer.

"Nick, you don't understand. I was raised with certain values, in a certain tradition..." Judy began.

"I've heard that schtick before, Judes, but I don't buy it. Our society is, from a big-picture perspective, monocultural: Same language, similar meanings, small pool of mannerisms. Our appearances and genetic dispositions are all that threaten to divide us. 'A certain tradition?' I mean, say what you want about the tenets of our reigning _leitkultur_ , Carrots, but at least it's an ethos."

Judy gave him a quizzical look. "Genetics and culture are on a continuum, Nick. Don't patronize me," she countered. "Nature versus nurture is an illusion. All changes in meaning are changes in matter for us solid animals…"

"...Is a fox shifty because of genetics, or because of an enculturation process?" She continued. "Where does one end and the other begin? Who cares? We end up with real differences whichever way you slice it. I can take those seriously without going overboard like folks did in the the predator-prey riots. I respect foxes like you, after all."

"What does that have to do with your casual racism writ large? It's still going strong," Nick retorted. "We both defy the stereotypes, you and I, regardless of how we ended up as our mold-breaking selves."

Now it was Judy's turn to sigh. "You have a point, Nick. But most animals stick to their stereotypes, and for generations we bunnies have acted out of a practical knowledge based on this undeniable fact. Why give that up? It's useful."

Nick scoffed. "Like you said, all changes in meaning are changes in matter, and you can make that change—" he nudged her again, "—solid bunny. All animals seek to meet the demands presented to them. Treat animals as the animals you want them to be, and they just might seek to meet that treatment. Or, they might not. But it's in your interest to try. We're all bound up in this together."

"I fear that if we had a clear idea of how closely we are bound to each other in good and evil, we truly could not live." Judy grimaced.

"Freakin' A," Nick agreed, finishing off his coffee. They enjoyed a comfortable silence. Then, after a while:

"Nick?"

"Judy?"

"Do you still want to be my boyfriend?"

"Sure."

"Do you still not want me to tag you in my relationship status?"

"It's not about what I want, Carrots, it's about what we're gonna do."

"Okay," Judy repeated her sentiment from earlier that night.

They sat together for another long stretch of silence, Nick absentmindedly playing with Judy's ears. She began to drift off to sleep. Nick's paw wandered around her whiskers, her chin, her cheek…

He suddenly found himself on the floor, nursing a dislocated shoulder and seeing stars. "What?"

Judy remained on the couch, her paw on her cheek. Nose twitching, eyes trembling.


	3. Cold Shoulder

Nick drove to the ER, one-armed. He had his shoulder set, was assured he was lucky and didn't need surgery, follow-up visits mandatory. Vicodin acquired, he made it back to his apartment by three in the morning.

Judy was passed out on the floor, surrounded by a thick halo of discarded RC Cola cans.

Nick was aghast. "Kid, did you hit a forty-eight pack?" He ran to her side to her pulse. He counted out quickly and guessed she must be around six-thousand beats per minute.

"Okay, pulse is near normal," Nick sighed in relief. "If you die of something else in the next few hours, I wash my paws of it."

With that, Nick fell back on his couch, angled his wounded shoulder as comfortably as possible, and drifted off to sleep.

* * *

Judy woke up hours later, forty-eight 'Royals still coursing through her overtaxed system. Using the Law of the Lever and various objects around Nick's apartment, she managed to hoist the poor fox from his couch, to the floor, to his bedroom, to his bed.

She ran her paw gently over Nick's shoulder. "Nick," she lamented, "you've gotta know I didn't mean it."

She called Nick in sick, made a nest of pillows on the floor beside him, and waited for him to wake up.

* * *

"Carrots."

Judy opened her eyes.

"Don't make me ask you," she heard Nick say.

She stared up at the ceiling. "I'm sorry," she said, her voice cracking.

Nick turned over on his unscathed side. He leaned his head over the edge of the bed so that he could look at her.

"I know that. I mean, what _happened_?" He asked. His voice was groggy. Morning, sleep, pain, meds.

Judy sat up. "First, I'm going to make us some more coffee!" She exclaimed with gusto before running to the kitchen.

Nick groaned.

Five minutes later she returned bearing two cups.

"I brought your favorite mug," Judy said adoringly. She handed Nick one of the cups, and he looked at the printed side: An enraged, photorealistic grizzy's face snarled back at him from inside a pink heart. The words "UNBEARABLY YOURS" were printed below in comic sans.

Judy had given it to him on their first police partner anniversary.

Nick sipped the coffee while Judy sat down on his bed, and began:

"You see, Nick," she explained, "I wasn't always a real police officer."

Nick laid back on the bed, head in his paw. "Okay," he answered.

"In fact, when I was a little girl, I was a _pretend_ police officer."

"Mhmm," Nick nodded into his paw. Two hours before he could pop another painkiller.

"I was on a pretend beat when I got into a fight."

Nick sighed. "A pretend fight?" He guessed.

"No, this was a real fight, with a fox, and he hit me, pow! Right across the face, with claws and everything, and there was blood, there were tears, you know..."

This time, Nick was silent.

"...and what do you know, it seems I have some latent—" Judy hopped up onto her feet, smiling at Nick. "P.—T.—S.—D!" She punctuated each letter with shadowbox punches.

"—and it activates when foxes touch my cheek! And you're a _fox_!" She stated proudly, pointing at Nick. "That, coupled with my traditional barn bunny childhood…"

"...makes me cringe when you touch my cheek with your paw." She finished. "Jinkies, I solved the case, Nick!"

Nick hung his head. "More than a cringe. So you kicked my arm out of its socket because of that, huh? Judes, how are we gonna work?" He tentatively rested his paw on her arm.

Judy looked deep into Nick's eyes. "What's a little something like this between friends? Between _lovers_?" She wriggled her eyebrows, attempting a sultry look.

Nick put his paw on her eyebrows to still them, minding her cheek.

"If you have this deep-seated fear of me, how can we be together?" Nick asked.

"Nick," Judy replied, "if I learned anything good from my bumpkin parents, it's that the heart is deep, evil and not worth looking into."

"Uh…"

Judy continued: "Who cares if some shadowy fear inside me doesn't like you? _I_ like you," She declared boldly.

Nick was proud of his little bunny, however…

"The problem is, that fear gets out of you. And into my arm," he pointed out.

Judy nodded. "You're right, Nick, you're right. But you know how I'm down from a one-ninety-two pack of 'Royals a day?"

"Yeah?" Nick responded.

"That's 'cause I have the force's best shrink on my side. If he can halve my 'Royal intake, he can help us through this mess."

Nick's pupils shrank. "You can't possibly mean…"

"Oh, but I do," Judy said, nuzzling her partner. "Tomorrow you and I are going to see…"

" **The bat.** "


End file.
